In Transition

Travel (verb): To go from one place to another.

“I have to leave.” I said.

I knew it was coming. I left no space for options. I unwound my commitments. School finished, the job left, furniture sold, and my belongings packed in containers, ready to be shipped. Still, much of life doesn’t fit into boxes. My sense of power was waning. A trajectory had been set in motion. The next chapter wasn’t coming from my pen. A decision to move was made but the destination for my breathing cargo wasn’t known.

“But where will you go?” She asked.

It didn’t matter, I knew. A breakdown had occurred. Hair pulled, tears streamed, confusion ensued. She lay next to me stroking my back. Poor animal, she must have thought. There was no access to my state. I had nothing to offer but sadness.

“I had no idea you felt like this.” She said.

My stationed place had become unbearable. The signs were there, illumined; yet I cloaked them. We don’t come to change willingly. I was a boy wrestling with the turning tide. It took mental bruising and a clichéd broken heart to abandon the past.

“I didn’t either.”

Journeys are not willed. By the time we heed the call, the decision has been brewing in the depths of our unconscious long before it emerges into awareness. What seems like choice we jump into is started by a deathly stumble. At best we can dive into the fall. We are brought into a space that is unfamiliar, overwhelming, and isolating. To be on our own. For better or for worse.

I left it all behind. Almost. I tried to bring her with me. That never works out the way you want it to. The constancy we crave doesn’t exist can’t exist in a state of wandering. She had her own journey to follow. Our paths diverged, she went left and I went insane. I ran. I ran, and at every broken turn, every forced pause, I met myself. The problems I sprinted from had been packed in with my clothes and sunscreen. I couldn’t avoid being burnt by them.

Grace intervened. Will had only taken me so far. I was being asked to let go. I met others in transition. Guides able to help. I breathed into the experience. Breathed deeply. Breathed widely. Accepted my state of exile. The sojourn as a stranger into lands unknown. The ways of acting, thinking, and being were transforming. This could only happen far from the land of old.

“It’ll get better.” She said.

To receive our boon also marks our call back. However, there is no guarantee of arrival. Everything rests on our decisions. When we are entangled with ego, attempting to manipulate and control the outcome, everything regresses, taking us to a state of willed ignorance. Allowing the arms of our transition to carry us, holds the possibility of reaching enlightened shores.

“How do you know?”

Returning home is the goal. Home is where the heart pulses. We wander looking for love, finding its chaotic ecstasy deep within. Carrying the treasure in our thumping chests, we come back overflowing with celestial riches. Outwardly the journey is circular; ending where we started. Inwardly it spirals up to heights unknown. Only by looking back does it make sense.